Cool dude! I like your cat's name!
"Never argue with a fool, people might not know the difference."
Thanks for the suggestion. I'm playing just UW. Heres my list for reference
4 x Sensei Divining Top
3 x Counterbalance
3 x Terminus
2 x Entreat the Angels
4 x Brainstorm
4 x Force of Will
2 x Counterspell
2 x Spell Pierce
4 x Swords to Plowshare
3 x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 x Elspeth, Knight Errant
2 x Snapcaster Mage
2 x Vendilion Clique
1 x Detention Sphere
4 x Flooded Strands
4 x Misty Rainforest
4 x Tundra
5 x Island
2 x Plains
1 x Karakas
3 x Mishra's Factory
SB
1 x Flusterstorm
1 x Spell Pierce
1 x Path to Exile
1 x Counterspell
2 x Disenchant
2 x Rest in Peace
2 x Meddling Mage
1 x Vendilion Clique
1 x Supreme Verdict
2 x Baneslayer Angel
1 x Terminus
i'm a little hesitant to run REBs because of wastelands. while i can possibly fetch out a mountain, but it makes the UU or WW casting costs a little too inconsistent for my liking.
I can't decide if the factories are really good. on one hand they have colour screwed me before, on another, they have been wonderful against opposing liliana's and jace. Might cut a Tundra for a Mystic Gate.
My results with the deck hasnt been too stellar. Most going 2-2 in local circuits. Trying to find ways to improve my play as well.
Legacy
Grixis Delver
Vintage
Mono Mentor
Team Leovold
I stuck with Miracles for the GP.
http://blog.mtgdeals.com/oarsman/gp-denver-25th/
We have not got the scroll down issue fixed yet, but you will find the top of the article by scrolling down an inch.
I wouldn't say that I have a solution yet. My plan going in was to use Meddling Mage and Misdirection to protect Counterbalance. In order to make room I was boarding out Terminus, since that would kill Mage anyway. I was going to lean heavily on RIP to help contain their Tarmgoyfs and Deathrite Shamans. This has worked decently in practice. It is still not a good matchup, but it might be good enough. One change I am definitely making is the Relic into a third RIP. I would rather have a Relic to mix in against RUG, but I am beating them so consistently that it probably doesn't even matter.
I've been jamming more or less a pure miracles list for a while. Aside from playing legacy every Wednesday, I haven't followed magic at all. What I have noticed is that the BUG decks, especially the Shardless Agent version, completely dominates UW Blade. Their matchup against Miracles isn't nearly as good, but both BUG archetypes are favored.
That said, the scariest thing about their decks isn't the goyfs or the shamans, it's the boatload of planeswalkers they run. Liliana, Jace, and often Garruk is quite a beating. I have not done any real testing, so this is conjecture, but when I was trying to think of a car that was good against these threats AND negated the impact of an early, unanswered goyf, I could only come up with one thing: Lingering Souls. Take that for what it's worth, but I've been toying with the idea of jamming Lingering Souls is a CounterTop shell for a while now. I may have to cut my Vendilion Cliques to make it happen, further complicating the love/hate relationship I have with that card.
On REB:
I agree with Anusien that REB is not as good here as it is against other blue decks. I believe this is because this matchup plays more like beatdown vs. control than control vs. control. That said, it's probably in your sideboard already for the stoneblade and miracles matchups. I usuallly bring it in, but I'm not married to the idea, and I always leave it out if they're jamming Wasteland or Stifle.
On Rest In Piece:
This card seems fine against them. However, I'd like to point out that taking out Counterbalances and brining in RiP is only going to keep their Abrupt Decays awesome. You either want to remove all of their good targets, or you want to saturate their deck so they won't be able to find enough Abrupt Decays.
Finally, what configuration are you guys using going into games two and three with regards to Swords to Plowshares and Terminus? I'm not sure if I want to just leave in the full eight, or remove some, or what.
Of course, you have to wonder if Lingering Souls actually does anything without a sword to equip.
Why are we so fond of keeping Counterbalance in against BUG decks? I mean, if they want to, they will most likely get rid of it with targeted discard in the early game anyway, and if we get it later, it doesn't affect the board situation much, plus they have lots of ways of dealing with it, be it just playing decay or trying to resolve Liliana or Jace, which Counterbalance can't handle reliably, not even with Top in play.
I was thinking of going more in the direction Einherjer posted here: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...l=1#post694520. Blanking Decay completely, apart from Snapcaster Mage and maybe Vendilion Clique (which are not good targets for AD) is the way to go for me.
Not with stifles (I really don't think they are good in a control deck), but with a couple of bolts, 4 snapcasters to take advantage of all the spot removal spells, CB in the board and less sweepers. I mean, people have adapted to Terminus anyway, and apart from random aggro decks, compenent players don't overextend into Terminus anymore. It is, more often than not, not much better than a simple 2-1. Bolt on the other hand does take care of Deathrite, Bob, Delver and everything Maverick plays in the early rounds, on top of killing planeswalkers.
It was quite good in testing so far, with one issue being the mana base. Since we need red early when casting a bolt, but also need u and w obviously, the mana base is not that solid any more. Some awkward situations did come up for me, despite playing 23 lands with only one of them being colorless.
Snapcaster is at its worst against BUG because of all their Deathrite Shamans.
You want to stretch to the long game against the BUG decks. The proportional value of their discard spells versus your counters goes up as players topdeck more.
I don't see why we are so scared of them Abrupt Decaying our Counterbalance. I mean, they can, but who cares? In the meantime they're not casting other spells, it probably prevents them from deploying and protecting Planeswalkers. I never sideboarded out Counterbalance against Krosan Grip.
Joe,
Thanks! I don't read many tournament reports anymore, but I find yours useful, both for your knowledge of this deck and for your knowledge of the Legacy format and tournament scene in general.
Congrats on your finish! Given the strength of your opponents (two of them made the top 16) and another two 'pros', I think that you did very well!
Dave
"Never argue with a fool, people might not know the difference."
This. Siding in Mage to name Decay against a Tarmogoyf deck seems mopey.
Regarding Lingering Souls: I've been playing 1-2 in my list and played 2 in my GP list. My deck was sweet, but I was pretty rusty in terms of play, I lost one match where I made a too conservative play and it cost me, and another where I made a greedy play and I lost, and a third where I made a flat-out misplay. Lack of quality playtesting definitely showed in day two of the event, but I can definitely see improvement.
About the list: Baneslayer was an addition I tried over Timely sideboard. I didn't really get to test it, but it seemed better against Bug in theory. It won me two matches, once against Zombies, and another against Canadian when he had Sulfur Elemental in play and a 5/6 Goyf. 6/4 first strike ya. Rest in Peace probably should have been Relics, which I prefer against Deathrite decks, as Dredge and Reanimator weren't common at the mid to top tables. At a local event or an SCG, I'd probably still play Rest in Peace over some amount of Relics. I probably also want to squeeze in another Jace in the main to fight against the mirror and midrange decks.
"Attack with Order of the Ebon Hand."
"K, block with Jotun Grunt?"
"It has pro white."
"Swords?"
"It still has pro white."
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Twitter: @shawnldewey
I disagree. It might be at its worst if your only out to a DS turn 1-3 are your 4 STP. If you have 7 one mana removal spells and 4 Snapcasters which are active T3, it's not a big problem. As odd as it may sounds, I think part of the solution to Deathrite Shaman is more Snapcasters, not less.
Sure, that's why we have the edge in the long game. Make sure you get there by having enough spot removal in the early game. Just sayin', before playing 3 Terminus, 1 Supreme Verdict, 1 Detention Sphere, I'd rather have more spot removal and enough ways to rebuy them these days.
Also disagree. You would sideboard out CB against decks where CB is not particularly good in the first place, even more so if they bring in removal for it (read: Maverick). I'd rather have my opponent have dead decays and grips in their hands than to offer them juicy targets to go "EOT decay your balance, next turn land a threat while I'm still tapped because I played said balance."
Thanks Dave, I appreciate that. I don't read nearly as many tournament reports as I used to either. Since we are about to have a lull in big events here in southern california, I am going be writing more articles that are not based on a particular event. It is certainly going to be different, since I won't be able to just throw down more match details when I run out of things to say. That's for later though, this week I have SCG San Diego.
I am sticking to my guns, but I think I am going to drop down to one snapcaster mage. Rest in Peace comes in a lot, and the 2/1 body isn't worth a ton on its own. I am thinking of replacing it with a maindeck misdirection. Meddling Mage might be on the way out also, to be replaced by something else that can help out against combo decks, perhaps the fourth Force.
Any opinions on Greater Auramancy (instead of, say, a set of Misdirection), especially with RiP/Helm?
Looks pretty lame to me, since it does nothing on its own. Those 75 slots are way too valuable for even considering such cards.
I see where you're coming from though - it does fulfill a similar role as Spellskite in PainterStone decks. However the reason Spellskite sees play is that it can buy some time to set up the combo by being a decent blocker.
That's funny because countering a Stifle to get that crucial land off your fetch or protecting the Miracle trigger can be pretty nice.
At the GP I had success with sideboarding Surgical Extraction vs BUG, the life loss was not a big deal and it removed Abrupt's to let my CB stay out, or Jace in one case so that my in play Jace wouldnt get legend ruled.
They were initially in my SB vs Combo and Dredge but found them to be good in the non Delver Bug matchups as well.
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